Hisar: Despite the Haryana Government’s efforts to normalise the situation in the violence-hit Mirchpur village of Hisar district, about 150 members of 34 Dalit families have left the village and taken shelter at Balmiki Dharamshala in the district. Saying it was impossible for them to live under constant threat and tension, the Dalits wanted the administration to rehabilitate them at a safer place. Heavy police security in the village and the personal efforts of Hisar Deputy Commissioner OP Sheoran failed to convince them. National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC) chairman Buta Singh and representatives of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) and the National Integration Council (NIC) had assured the Dalit families that they would be rehabilitated, compensated and given full security and justice by the administration. On Wednesday, a group of upper caste men had set on fire about 20 houses in a Dalit locality, killing physically challenged Suman (18) and her father Tara Chand (70). Meanwhile, the administration has distributed a compensation of Rs 25 lakh to the victims’ next of kin. Although the three families who had left Mirchpur after the incident returned in a couple of days, the strident tone of the members of the khap panchayat — which was held on Saturday — shook their confidence. They decided to leave the village en masse. Fear was writ large on their faces and they traveled on foot up to Barwala town and took mini-trucks and four-wheelers to reach Hisar by evening. The khap panchayat, comprising representatives from 37 khaps, was held under the chairmanship of Rajbir Dhanda. The meeting asked the Government to release all those arrested and withdraw of cases filed against the SHO and the tehsildar of Narnaund in connection with the incident. The panchayat also demanded a CBI or CID inquiry into the incident. The leaders also alleged that the police was harassing innocents. The police have arrested 29 persons so far. They have provided a list of 45 persons to Rajbir Dhanda to hand them over the police. The khap also demanded registration of cases against Dalit youth for hurling stones and firing at upper caste and announced another Khap Mahapanchayat on May 9 to review the situation and take follow-up action. Kamla, who lost her daughter and husband in the fire on Wednesday, is among those who fled the village. “I have lost everything in Mirchpur and do not want any harm coming to my three sons. I don’t even have a photograph of my daughter as all were burnt inside the house. My children feel scared and cry whenever they see a group of people coming,” she told mediapersons. Vir Bhan, a member of Mirchpur gram panchayat, has come out of the village with his family. He was among the two members of the Balmiki community who had gone to apologise before the upper caste people to diffuse the tension. But they were badly beaten up and hospitalised. Those taking shelter at Balmiki Dharamshala in Hisar include the families of Ramnivas, Satyavan, Kuldip, Mukesh , Omprakash , Naresh, Sanjay, Surjit, Raju, Suresh Jaibhagwan, Sandip, Banni, Dharambir, Mahender, Ramphal, Jugti, Gurmit, Amit, Pala, Balwan and Sundar. They said they had already sent their children to their relatives in other villages. Some youth said they had lost their certificates in the fire and do not know how to get duplicate certificates. Meanwhile, the meeting of khap panchayats on Saturday demanded amendments in the Hindu Marriage Act to prevent marriages within the gotra and village. The Sarv Jatiya Sarv Khap Mahapanchayat, presided over by president of the Mor Khap Mewa Singh, urged all the MPs and MLAs of the State to support the demand. The mahapanchayat decided that its representatives would meet the MPs and MLAs of the State and seek their cooperation for bringing amendments in the Hindu Marriage Act. (Pioneer 27/4/10)

NEW DELHI: Calling for talks between Maoists and the government, writer Arundhati Roy on Saturday demanded an immediate ceasefire on both sides, formal halting of the combing operations and Operation Green Hunt, and resettling people who were rendered homeless in Chhattisgarh’s Dantewada district. Ms. Roy also demanded that details of memoranda of undertaking signed between the government and mining industries, involving tribal regions, be made public. She was speaking at a public meeting here on ‘Indian state’s War on People and the Assault on Democratic Voices’. It was organised by the Forum Against War on People, a forum of civil society organisations, parties, individuals and social activists. While the death of CRPF personnel at the hands of the Maoists was saddening, one could not dismiss the alleged atrocities committed by the security personnel against tribals, Ms. Roy said. Ms. Roy alleged that the government was not interested in talks as it claimed. Randhir Singh, head of the Political Science department in Delhi University, said: “The political parties in India seem to have decided that neo-liberal capitalism is the way to proceed. The kind of development the government is practising in tribal areas can be labelled ‘developmental terrorism’.” The challenge for the Maoists was to provide a viable alternative mode of development as opposed to the modes proposed by the ruling classes, he said. Giving an account of the situation in West Bengal’s Lalgarh, activists claimed that owing to the presence of the joint security forces, people could not venture out to earn their livelihoods. They were routinely tortured on suspicion of being Maoists, and their women were harassed. “Operation Green Hunt is causing a great deal of trouble. People are arrested without warrants, peaceful rallies are fired upon, women are insulted and basic health facilities are not available. The government does not allow anyone to enter this zone as it does not want its wrongdoings exposed,” said activist Badshah Mandi, who also claimed that developmental facilities built by the People’s Committee against Police Atrocities were routinely destroyed. B.D. Sharma, former Commissioner of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Commission, said the basic conflict could be rooted in ownership of resources. “While the government behaves as if it owns the land, the tribals have traditional rights to the land.” According to the Supreme Court, the government did not have the right to hand over tribal land to others, he said. Poet Varavara Rao said talks should take place between the government and the Maoists, in the same way the exercise was made possible between the Maoists and the Andhra Pradesh government with media and civil society efforts. However, “it is not possible for anyone to condone Maoist violence.” Speakers alleged that the media had not been accurate in reporting and presenting an analysis of the events related to the Maoists. Stress was laid on simultaneously calling a halt to “state atrocities on people” as well as Maoist violence. (Times of India 23/4/10)

BHUBANESWAR: The Orissa government on Tuesday decided to make a fresh move to invite the Border Roads Organisation to undertake road and bridge construction in Maoist-hit areas, official sources said. This was decided at a meeting chaired by chief secretary T.K. Mishra.

JAGDALPUR: Maoists killed three villagers, including former Salwa Judum leader Rajkumar Naik, on Tuesday in two incidents in Bhairamgarh in Bijapur district, south Chhattisgarh. Two BSNL employees were critically injured by the pressure bomb in Bijapur after they came into contact with it while repairing telephone cables, police said.

NEW DELHI: Pakistan-based terror outfit Lashkar-e-Tayyeba is making concerted efforts to carry out attacks in the country and develop links in the Maldives and other neighbouring countries, Minister of State for Home Affairs Ajay Maken said on Tuesday. “Available inputs indicate that Pakistan-based terrorist groups, primarily the Lashkar, are making concerted efforts to organize terrorist attacks in various parts of the country, inter-alia, including iconic institutions, prominent industrial installations and tourist locations among others,” he told the Lok sabha.

(PTI) The embattled Lalit Modi flew into the city today to hold consultations with eminent lawyers Harish Salve and Ram Jethmalani amid speculation that he was exploring legal options to challenge his suspension as IPL Commissioner.

Modi first had a meeting with Salve which lasted close to two hours and then was closeted with Jethmalani for some time.

Though it is not known what transpired in these meetings, it is learnt that Modi discussed the show cause notice issued to him by the BCCI and the legal aspects of the entire IPL controversy.

Neither Modi nor Salve were willing to divulge anything.

“I have nothing say anything now. Nothing. You may wait outside my hotel room, but I am not going to say anything”, Modi, who seemed quite annoyed by the media presence, said.

PTI) BJP’s four-month honeymoon with Shibu Soren ended abruptly today with the party withdrawing support to the JMM-led government, a day after the Jharkhand Chief Minister sided with the UPA in the Lok Sabha.

A meeting of the BJP top brass, headed by party chief Nitin Gadkari, decided to withdraw support immediately giving indications that the new experiment in Ranchi has floundered.

“The BJP Parliamentary Board has decided to withdraw support immediately to the Shibu Soren government. He (Soren) has behaved in a very dubious manner and voted with the government during the cut motion. BJP has taken very serious note of this betrayal and dubious conduct,” senior BJP leader Ananth Kumar told reporters here.

New equations in Jharkhand appeared to be in the offing with AICC in-charge of the state K Keshav Rao saying, “There is nobody untouchable in politics….

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today called on the Afghan authorities to probe last October’s attack on a United Nations guesthouse in Kabul after a board of inquiry suggested that a UN staffer may have been killed by Afghan security forces who may have mistaken him for an insurgent.

Five UN staff members lost their lives and several others were injured in the 28 October terrorist attack, for which the Taliban claimed responsibility, on the Bakhtar guesthouse were 34 UN staff were residing.

The report by the UN’s internal Board of Inquiry, the findings of which were made public today, describes “the confused situation at the Bakhtar guesthouse with the attackers and responding security personnel both dressed in Afghan police uniforms and a fire raging through the compound.

“The report suggests the possibility that a UN staff member, Close Protection Officer Louis Maxwell, may have been killed by Afghan security forces who may have mistaken him for an insurgent,” according to a statement issued by Mr. Ban’s spokesperson.

Mr. Maxwell, a United States national, was credited along with fellow UN security officer Lawrence Mefful of Ghana, who was also killed that day, with holding off the attackers long enough for UN colleagues to escape, thereby saving many lives during the incident.

“It is not clear how he was killed, even though there is a strong sense that he may have been killed by some of the Afghan police,” Under-Secretary-General for Field Support Susana Malcorra stated at a news conference in New York.

She emphasized the chaos that prevailed in the midst of the attack, stressing that there was a lack of clear understanding about who was fighting who, particularly since the attackers were dressed in Afghan police uniforms.

“We need to pursue this with the Afghan authorities so that we have a full-fledged understanding [of the attack], which we haven’t been able to obtain so far through the Board of Inquiry,” said Ms. Malcorra, who added that the report’s findings have been shared with Afghan authorities, the families of those killed and the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which is carrying out its own investigation into the incident.

While amateur video footage of part of the attack that was obtained by the UN suggests that Mr. Maxwell may have been shot at close range, Ms. Malcorra noted that forensic evidence indicated that he was shot from a long distance.

“The footage shows clearly a person surrounded by Afghan police and, if I recall correctly, two shots and the person falling. It’s not clear from the footage that the two shots were made from close range.

“What is clear is that the forensic studies that were performed proved that they were done from a long range,” she added. “We need to fully connect how it is that he was surrounded by people and he was eventually shot by somebody from farther away.”

Today’s statement noted that the four-member Board of Inquiry, set up in December 2009 and led by former UN Police Advisor Andrew Hughes, was not able to determine who fired the shots that killed the three other UN staff members, “though it leaves open the possibility that they also may have been killed by friendly fire.”

The report also highlights a number of shortcomings in the UN’s security measures as well as with respect to coordination between the UN and both its international partners and the host government authorities.

“The Secretary-General reiterates the UN’s commitment to transparency and the strengthening of security for its personnel serving in dangerous locations,” said the statement.

“He calls on the Afghan authorities to ensure a thorough investigation into the attack on the guesthouse and the killing of UN staff.”

Mr. Ban has also instructed that the Under-Secretary-General for Safety and Security, Gregory Starr, review the security findings highlighted in the report. Mr. Starr will lead a team to Kabul next week, to discuss next steps and follow up with the Afghan authorities.

The Secretary-General has also instructed Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations Alain Le Roy and UN Special Representative in Afghanistan Staffan de Mistura to contact relevant NATO officials in Brussels and Kabul for further consultations on how best to ensure improved coordination in the event of future emergencies of this nature.

The three other UN staff killed in the attack were Jossie Esto of the Philippines, who worked for the UN Development Programme (UNDP) election team; Yah Lydia Wonyene, a UNDP elections officer from Liberia; and Teshome Mandefro Egrete, an Ethiopian engineer working with the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF).